Another difference that I’ve noted is that the Army FAOs are coded more specifically when it comes to their regional focus. For example, they have folks that are sub-saharan Africa FAOs, North African FAOs, etc…The answer is that sometimes (rarely) we do, and when we don't it's mostly because of competitiveness, career milestones, and the way we assign billets. If you're a EUCOM FAO and you need your next billet to be SDO/DATT, welp, there are only a handful of SDO/DATT billets in EUCOM for Navy (they're assigned by service). So you could end up doing your SDO/DATT tour in Southcom. I'm not sure how it is right now, but in the past we had the tendency to pick up senior-ish O-3s with weak records at lateral transfer boards (aviators, because the ones with strong records tended to stay flying), so the main priority was not fit/fill or maximizing utilization, but trying to get them healthy for the next board.
Army: Selected for FAO, 4-year training pipeline including Masters degree (usually at high-level civilian institution like SAIS, Harvard, Tufts, etc), core regional language study, and usually 18-ish months in-region training (IRT) which, for EUCOM guys, can include a few months at the Marshall Center and then spending the rest in 3-6 month blocks at different embassies in the region. Maybe a few months at COCOM too. End result is a fully-qualified FAO ready for just about any billet.
Navy: Try to select FAOs who already have qualified with language, already have masters (NWC counts), and already have been assigned somewhere overseas so that they don't require time and $$ to train to full qualification. If no masters, then usually NPS is the first stop to get that check in the box. There are lots of Embassy (ODC, some attache) O-4 billets for AFRICOM, CENTCOM, SOUTHCOM. EUCOM, not so much. PACOM has some. So EUCOM and PACOM, good chance you'll head to a staff unless you know somebody. EUCOM will probably be CNE so that you can also check that "overseas" box.
I had been a "fully qualified FAO" for about 4 years when I arrived to my embassy assignment at the same time as an Army O-4 FAO. He was MILES ahead of me. Why? At least partly because he had worked for 6-9 months in that same embassy as an IRT guy.
I work in a division at AFRICOM with six officers. Two of them are Army Africa FAOs leveraging their previous in-region experience, and the third is an Army CENTCOM FAO but was the former DATT in Sudan (speaks Arabic) and supervises the branch that includes Sudan. The remaining three are Navy, only one of whom is in region.
The Army may assign folks to tours out of region, but I get the sense it’s not until the senior levels (e.g. our O-6 division chief is an Army PACOM FAO).
On the topic of education, I came in “fully qualified,” so I didn’t get any lead-in training. My job (when I’m not TAD) is being the easy button for the ODC Chiefs in my country portfolio. It’s definitely been a steep learning curve figuring out how best to assist them when I’m learning on the job. On the bright side, I will get focused training if/when I’m assigned to be an ODC Chief or a DATT in a follow-on tour.
Also, we do send some FAOs to the Marshall Center in lieu of NPS for their initial education, but the Army still dominates the program.
On the record piece (at least in my cohort this summer), it seemed like a mixed bag of people that wanted FAO and transitioned with strong records in their parent community, a few that realized that they didn’t like their job, and some that had no option but to transfer if they wanted to stay in. There were way more O-4s than I expected, even though the community is theoretically trying to push to access officers earlier.
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